


The Distant and Dead

by Murf1307



Category: Criminal Minds, Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Alternate Universe - Steampunk, Angst, Bigotry, Corset, Crossover, Crossover Pairings, Drug Use, F/F, F/M, M/M, Masquerade Ball, References to Abuse, Religious Imagery & Symbolism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-09
Updated: 2012-05-08
Packaged: 2017-11-05 01:06:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/400760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Murf1307/pseuds/Murf1307
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The year is 1892.  Sherlock Holmes has been dead for over a year, and when it appears that Jack the Ripper has returned, Scotland Yard calls in a team of American detectives to take the case.  But the plot thickens when an American appears to be involved in the crimes – an American the team has faced before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first part of my Steampunk Profilers crossover AU. There will be sequels to come, as well as several interludes that take place during this fic. The rather lengthy pairing list above is about half of the pairings this series will eventually cover; I’ve got a lot of work ahead of me for this one.

“I am exposed…let up again to feel the puzzle of puzzles  
And that we call Being.”  
~ Walt Whitman

 

  
PART ONE

 

London. 

Reid looked down on the smoky, smoggy city. Spires tore upward toward them from beneath the cover, soaring to heights that nearly rivaled those of New York. The wind whipped his hair back and nearly blew off his glasses, but he stayed on the promenade of the dirigible, staring down into the umber and coal unknown, and what awaited them.

“It’s a pretty city,” murmured Prentiss, who was leaning on the guardrail. Out of all of them, only she and Rawson had ever been in London. “A lot of bustle, but not much worth noticing.”

Garcia stormed out of the inside of the dirigible, grumbling. “I’m going to kill them. If their arguing doesn’t kill me first.” She let out a melodramatic sigh that Reid knew was mostly an affectation. “I swear I may just carry my library down to Scotland Yard myself.”

“Hmm?” Prentiss looked at Garcia, eyes still drifting periodically down to the city below.

“Morgan has a problem with Mick helping with my library.”

Reid shook his head and smiled. “Morgan has a problem with you being anywhere near a man like Rawson. Or Simms, for that matter.”

“So it is about Battle.” She huffed, and headed back inside, goggles slipping a little on her head.

Prentiss laughed. “When do you think they’ll give in?”

Reid tilted his head as it took him a moment to process what she meant. Then he lifted an eyebrow. “I think it’ll have to be soon. If Morgan doesn’t make a move, then she will. I’m sure she sees it, and propriety has never been something she gave a thought about.”

Prentiss nodded and turned her eyes back to the city as they circled it, lower and lower as the pilot searched for a dock. Reid imagined they must seem like a great hulking vulture, menacing and ominous, and he smiled. He knew one person in London ought to feel menaced by their arrival – they were the best, other than the recently deceased London native, Sherlock Holmes.

They had never had a chance to work with Holmes, though Rawson had unknowingly served in the same unit as Dr. John Watson, who would go on to become the Great Detective’s companion and biographer. It was a pity; while Holmes’ passing left their team as the greatest criminal investigators in the world, it would have been fascinating to work with and learn from a man who could do everything they did all by himself.

Another grumbling voice, deeper than Garcia’s, shook Reid from his thoughts. David Rossi walked up next to him, clamping his hands around the guardrail.

Rossi had been one of the first generation of this team, having worked with Jason Gideon – ah, thinking him was still a sting – and John Douglas to study and compile all the information that they could on criminals and their behavior. Rossi rejoining the team a few years ago had helped bring Reid out of a funk that the others had thought would last forever, and Reid still enjoyed learning from him – as well as generally enjoying his company.

“Why did we have to use the damn airship? Regular goddamn boats work just as well.” Another thing to know about David Rossi: he got severely airsick, particularly during the descent.

Reid attempted to be soothing. “Scotland Yard requested we come to London ‘with all possible speed,’” he quoted. He nearly put a hand on Rossi’s shoulder, but thought the better of it; he was not one to offer physical comforts. That was Garcia’s area of expertise. “And we’ll be landing soon.”

A sudden gust slammed a wall of smog into Reid’s face as he finished speaking, and he coughed violently, his entire body spasming.

Then there were hands on his shoulders, steadying him. It took him a moment to realize who the hands belonged to – Rossi. For all of the older man’s gruffness and sarcastic demeanor, there had always been an underpinning of careful, quiet strength to him, and that strength seemed at the forefront now.

Reid blinked to clear the remaining smoke from his eyes and coughed once more – this time more from surprise than anything else.

Rossi’s face was only a few inches from his own, looking at him with an urgent concern.

“I’m fine,” he mumbled, uncertain as to whether he ought to pull away. For the moment he didn’t, instead shading his eyes under his eyelashes – he rationalized that as a guard against remaining smoke, not against the intensity of Rossi’s eyes; that he swore.

There was a brief, hanging moment, and then Rossi withdrew, returning to his death-grip on the rail of the promenade. The dock, Reid realized, was extremely close.

“Almost there,” murmured Simms as the man walked up beside him. “You all right? You look pale.”

Reid nodded. “I’m fine.”

“You almost fell off the damn airship, and you call yourself fine?” Rossi said, looking about ready to kill whoever invented the dirigible – Ferdinand von Zeppelin – as well as Scotland Yard for requesting their help.

“I didn’t ‘almost fall off the damn airship,’” Reid quoted, glad to fall into the familiar game where Rossi would say something utterly ridiculous, and he would refute it after repeating Rossi’s fallacy in as dry a tone as he could manage. Rossi never admitted to being wrong, but it didn’t matter. “The guardrail is there specifically to prevent that from occurring. You’re exaggerating, Dave.”

He almost started in surprise; he never used Rossi’s first name, though he remembered Rossi requesting it early on in their acquaintance – during the case involving a killer who used electricity to torture his victims. He had no idea why he used it now.

Rossi raised an eyebrow, and Reid was uncertain as to whether he doubted Reid’s reasoning – which he oughtn’t – or if he was surprised that Reid used his first name. Mostly, the team was on a first-name basis with each other in private – the exceptions being himself, as he was still far too formal, and Ashley Seaver, who was new enough to feel she hadn’t yet earned the privilege.

He tried to defuse the moment by looking back at London. They’d pierced the low-hanging clouds, and, from what Reid could see, Prentiss was right about the bustle. People moved quickly, and hansoms moved faster, sometimes seeming to race each other down narrow streets.

“Welcome to London,” Mick Rawson said from somewhere behind Reid, his Welsh accent fitting the vista perfectly. “City of fog, fog, and more fog.”

Reid looked over his shoulder and found the rest of the team was on the promenade as well. Sam Cooper stood next to Beth Griffith, looking down at the city appraisingly. Garcia straightened her goggles and glanced over at Morgan, who still looked frustrated. Gina LaSalle leaned against the doorway, hand on her hip. Seaver had walked up on Rossi’s other side. Aaron Hotchner, leader of the team, stood off a little ways from everyone else, leaning on the guardrail, his expression sober and guarded.

In a few moments they would dock, and then it would be time to gather their belongings and make their way to Scotland Yard, but, in this moment, Reid was content in the company of his colleagues and friends.

 

Housed in the infamous Tower of London, Scotland Yard was somewhat drafty. Ashley pulled her shawl tighter around herself as the team, sans Cooper, Beth, LaSalle, Simms, and Rawson – they kept that arm of the team a secret, for better undercover work.

A mousy man introduced himself as Inspector Lestrade and shuffled them into a small room with a table and a lamp and not much else but case files.

He gestured at the large pile of papers and newspaper clippings. “That’s all we have. You may want to send the ladies out of the room; these are some gruesome murders.” He looked at Hotch with a soft certainty – as if the women on the team ought to be protected from their own work.

“Inspector,” Prentiss said pleasantly, “Have you had the opportunity to speak to a man who raped and killed fifteen women in three months? Or have you tracked down a man who killed indiscriminately for twenty years before anyone noticed?” Her voice stayed light and airy, but Ashley knew that there was a storm coming.

Garcia seemed to catch what Prentiss was starting. She spoke up, smiling with utterly false cheer. “Do you run searches through every American crime since the Civil War, and spend your day looking through sketches and photographs just in case someone missed something?”

Lestrade looked like he was about to faint. “No,” he practically squeaked.

A snicker escaped from Prentiss, who looked utterly impish. She swept around to the pile of papers and sat down. “Let’s get down to business, then.”

The team gathered around her, Morgan and Garcia pulling the mechanical library into place nearby. There was a lot of reading to be done, and probably a lot of researching beyond that. Reid pulled a sheaf of paper out of the middle of the stack at random and began to read, sitting on the corner of the table.

“Can he actually…?” Lestrade looked even fainter, if that were possible. 

“Yes, he can,” Rossi said breezily. “Something around twenty thousand per minute, right, Reid?” He pulled a few more papers from the stack and ignored Lestrade entirely.

Ashley bit her lip to keep from laughing. Rossi had raised her from the age of fifteen, and she knew that Rossi was being intentionally frustrating but also fiercely protective. She’d seen Rossi, in the short time she’d been a colleague of his as well as an adopted daughter, be that way in defense of everyone. She let the corner of her lip quirk up as she pulled up a sheet of paper that turned out to be an autopsy report dated 1888, of a woman named Mary Kelly.

She swallowed as her eyes scanned the page. “Rage,” she whispered.

There was a murmur of agreement around the room. Hotch rounded the table to read over her shoulder. She felt him nod behind her, and he practically radiated sober disgust and determination.

“According to the autopsy of Mary Kelly – the penultimate of the Whitechapel murders – the cause of death was a knife to the throat,” Hotch said. “Excessive post-mortem disfiguration of the face and reproductive organs. Evisceration; the crime scene was covered in Kelly’s blood.” Hotch drew away, and Ashley looked at everyone else. Rossi’s expression was dark. Morgan’s was darker. Prentiss seemed stoic. Reid was still looking at the page he was reading, but it was clear he wasn’t actually reading anything. Garcia was the most open, looking rather ill at the prospect.

“The Ripper hit his signature here, point by point,” Morgan said quietly. Murders like this were rare, even for their profession. This kind of disorganized fury, to Ashley’s knowledge, had only happened three or four times in the team’s thirty-five-year history.

The most recent situation, if she remembered correctly, was the case of the Boston Reaper, who had stalked the Massachusetts city for a little over two years before the team (minus her; she hadn’t joined the team until a few months ago) drew close enough for him to disappear. His modus operandi was as disorganized and frenzied as possible, but he had never left any kind of forensic evidence on the body.

Ashley shook herself from her reverie to find that Reid had begun to speak. “—And the method of disposal for the original five Whitechapel murders evolves up to the fifth murder; by then, the subject has started an elaborate staging ritual combined with the previous removal of internal organs. No sign of medical training, according to the autopsies.”

“Agreed,” Prentiss murmured. “And the new murders seem to pick up where Mary Kelly’s murder left off. Look at the autopsy report for the latest one. The staging gets almost ridiculous at this point, with one breast stuffed through the rectum and the nose severed and placed in the chest cavity. Body is missing the heart and the reproductive organs.” Prentiss looked up and met everyone’s eyes. “This is odd, given how quiet he was for the last four years. Someone with this advanced pathology would be teetering on the edge of a spree.”

“And yet,” Rossi pointed out, “He has the presence of mind to clean up after himself. Not a shred of a fiber or a fingerprint – if she struggled, he scraped her fingernails clean.”

“Mixed organized and disorganized, then,” Hotch said, pointing at something Prentiss was holding, a police sketch. “But it’s not likely this is a team. Inspector Lestrade,” he called, and Ashley turned to see the mousy man had gotten much closer to the door during the conversation and looked rather green. “Is this everything? Do you have any physical evidence or witnesses for the most recent murders?”

Lestrade seemed to try and pull himself together – Ashley sympathized; she’d been ill on her boots at her first crime scene, which was a couple of steps down from this brutality – and nodded. “There was nothing on the bodies – no clothing, no identifiers for either the victims or the killer. And no witnesses, either.”

“Where’s the letter?” Reid asked suddenly, ruffling through the stack of files. “From the original five murders – the ‘From Hell’ letter. It’s not here.”

“That belonged to Sherlock Holmes.”

 

Reid finally looked up from the stack of papers at the unfamiliar voice. The speaker was a mustachioed man, looking to be about thirty to thirty-five in age, but leaning heavily on a cane. The smell of alcohol was tangible, even from this distance, and Reid tilted his head to the side.

“Dr. Watson, if I’m not totally mistaken,” he stated. The man nodded, meeting his eyes. He had a dull, dark blue gaze that spoke of brokenness.

“Yes,” the man said.

The room was deadly quiet. It was clear that Dr. John H. Watson was a shattered man in the wake of Holmes’ death. Holmes had been dead for over a year now, but Reid could see that no time – none at all – had passed for Dr. Watson. His eyes were dead. Reid had seen those eyes a grand total of once – Gideon, his mind unhelpfully supplied – but they were burnt into his memory like a brand. Those dead eyes explained everything and yet…

“You said Holmes owned the ‘From Hell’ letter?” Rossi questioned, harshly. Reid almost flinched, but Watson didn’t seem to notice the hostility.

“He did. Took it with him. Like the woman’s picture, because he’d never caught the man.”

“Irene Adler,” Garcia whispered, almost reverent. Reid turned toward her, and she blinked, explaining, “The one woman who ever outsmarted Sherlock Holmes – it’s in one of the stories.”

Watson barked a false, bitter laugh. “A Scandal in Bohemia. How we fought over that one.”

Lestrade slid over and put a hand on Watson’s shoulder. “Dr. Watson, perhaps you should sit down. Please.”

Watson sat, and maybe Reid should not have been surprised by the lack of tears in the doctor’s eyes, but then he remembered that the deepest sorrows were beyond tears.

Watson’s presence rattled him, reminded him of the past, of things that had ended. He tried to push back the thoughts of Gideon, the memories of sixteen years of association with the man he could almost have called his father, if not in name or blood. Gideon had raised him – or rather, funded his schooling and provided a home for him, as he’d pretty much raised himself already – after his mother had been committed when he was twelve.

When Gideon disappeared after the case in Arizona that had followed them back to DC, Reid had not known how to react. Things had been occurring that hurt the team for about nine months before – he shouldn’t have been surprised that something would push Gideon over the edge.

He had been surprised, though, that Gideon had told no one where he was going, or that he was going at all.

Shaking himself back to the present, Reid caught Morgan looking at him sidelong, as if he suspected what was going on in Reid’s head. Reid hoped he didn’t. His arm itched, part from a memory and part from a current desire, and if Morgan was keeping an eye on him…

His hand shifting to his elbow drew Watson’s eyes for a moment, and something seemed to twinge in his expression.

“Well,” Rossi asked, looking from Lestrade (with minor disgust) to Watson (with minor pity). “Does anyone happen to have a facsimile of this letter? It doesn’t seem like something you’d just leave one copy of.”

Lestrade shifted guiltily. “We did not keep one.”

“Assumed Holmes was some kind of immortal, didn’t you?” Watson said, pointedly, wheeling on the inspector. Then he seemed to deflate. “But then, didn’t we all…”

Reid kept an eye on the erratic doctor as he gauged everyone else’s reactions to the new complication. Morgan kept himself expressionless, standing like a sentry behind him and Garcia. Garcia had a thoughtful expression on, biting at her lip and stealing a glance at her library. Prentiss was retreating into her thoughts – compartmentalizing her emotions away from the facts at hand. Rossi looked very close to asking rapid-fire interrogatives, eyebrows drawn down and dark eyes sparking. Seaver looked uncomfortable with everything. Hotch…was Hotch.

“Dr. Watson,” Hotch said, breaking the moment of silence, “do you still have access to yours and Holmes’ old apartment?”

“The flat?” Watson seemed to become even more lifeless. “No.”

“His brother, Mycroft Holmes…he came into Holmes’ possessions when he – passed.” Lestrade patted the doctor on the shoulder. “He is not a man to cross.”

Garcia seemed on the verge of saying something, but ultimately remained silent.

Watson also seemed on the edge of speaking for a moment, and actually did. “I will do whatever I can to help you.” It’s not like I have anything better to do, with him gone, his expression seemed to add at the end of the spoken declaration. The unspoken almost rang louder than the spoken for Reid, and he nodded.

Hotch seemed to take Watson’s offer in stride, as he took everything in stride; with a look of stone and a flash of gratitude warming in his voice. “Thank you, Dr. Watson.”

Reid felt the room relax from a tension he had previously not noticed, and returned to the documents to run them over once more. Though he could recite them word for word if he chose, he still preferred the calming sensation of running his fingertip down the page, the words flowing into his mind as his eyes followed his hand.

Even without the “From Hell” letter, he was sure they would catch the Ripper.

 

Seaver followed up the rear as Cooper, Griffith, LaSalle, Rawson, and Simms started their undercover operation. She would be accompanying LaSalle, Rawson, and Simms, while Cooper and Griffith would break off alone to dig a little deeper.

"Are you sure you're comfortable with this?" Rossi had asked her, and she'd replied with an affirmative. She couldn't just sit back and wait forever; she was going to be a profiler -- she had to gather information as well as interpret it. She was ready for her first undercover with the "Shadow Team," as they called themselves. She had to be.

She picked up her pace to fall in line with LaSalle, hoping the company would put her nervousness out of her mind.

They were all dressed in fairly unfashionable clothing, old, dirty, ragged, the better to blend in with the crowds in the slums. She herself had looked in the mirror and decided she looked rather like a prostitute, in the tight red bodice and torn skirt. LaSalle was wearing men's clothes, and her long hair was tied up and tucked into her hat. She'd bound her chest flat, and the loose trousers kept her hips a secret.

The men were pretty much the same as they would normally be, but with more grime. Simms had never cared much for fashion, and had done enough time in prison to move well in this den of crime. Rawson was dark, his entire body language talking of power and intimidation. She looked at the wolfish slope of his body and wondered where he'd learned it.

"How are you?" LaSalle whispered, the affected Cockney accent taking her voice and twisting it low -- she was still beautiful, even dressed as a man.

Ashley smiled, trying to hide her nerves. “I’m fine.”

They continued, deeper into the slums. The stench was awful here; urine, feces, alcohol, and a hint of blood and rotten flesh. It was worse than any crime scene, and she hardly wanted to go any farther into the area, but the Ripper had risen again, and all of this was necessary.

Cooper and Griffith broke off from the group, and LaSalle seemed to be keeping close as Ashley picked up the rear. It was a dark place, this slum.

It wasn’t very long before a street boy caught sight of them and recognized them.

“Welcome t’ the slums,” he muttered, brushing by Ashley. “I was one o’ Sherlock Holmes’s Baker Street Irregulars. Heard y’ were after the Ripper tonight.”

LaSalle nodded down at the slender, dark haired waif. He was still a wide-eyed teenage boy, pale skin grimy and hands atwitch. He looked fierce and feral underneath, though, a product of the streets that gave no rest to the poor and the needy, who turned to crime as a result.

“We’re askin’ after whomever’s killing prostitutes here,” Mick said, drawing even with the young boy. “You got a name, kid?”

“Nathan.” A pained expression crossed his face. “And nobody’s quite sure. Nobody knew a thing the first time around – an’ we know less this time.” He paused, gesturing softly toward a corner. “The street girls are terrified – rentboys too, but less.”

“All righ’,” LaSalle murmured down to him. “Has anything changed ‘round here lately – anybody with a real vested interest in the fact that they’ve brought in Americans to work the case?”

Nathan bit his lip, thinking hard. His eyes were cloudy for a moment, then cleared. “Nobody I can tell. But there’s a new boss in town here – somebody scarin’ people even worse than the Ripper’s got the street girl’s petticoats in a twist – he’s got his hooks in everyone. Don’t have any word as to a name…anybody who mighta seen him’s dead, far as we know.”

“Has anyone heard from him?” Simms asked, his Georgia accent drawling more than usual.

“Think so. I got a friend – one of the street girls. She’s real pretty – gets the best of the Johns and hears a lot that way.” He turned, gesturing for them to follow.

They followed, their eyes keeping on Nathan’s slender form in the darkness of the night.

He lead them through the narrow alleys of the slums, Ashley trying not to step in anything without losing any speed. It was a few minutes of silent walking before they stopped on a corner and Nathan tapped a woman on the shoulder, leaning up to whisper in her ear.

She turned and looked at them. She was a pretty woman, as Nathan had said, her blonde hair piled up on her head, with some curls falling free on her shoulders, which were mostly bare – her dress had a huge, scooped neckline, and it was blood red, lit by her lantern. She looked at them quietly, judging them, and nodded her assent to speaking to them.

LaSalle took the lead again, stepping lightly on the cobblestones as she moved – her facsimile of a male gait was absolutely perfect. Ashley followed, and the men brought up the rear.

“Ma’am,” LaSalle began. “Jim LaSalle.” She held out a hand, and the woman shook it.

“Carolyn.”

LaSalle nodded, her expression as smooth as the prostitute’s. “What can you tell us about the Ripper, or about this new power in the slums?”

Carolyn paled. “The Ripper’s rippin’ again,” she hissed. “That’s all anybody knows. We got girls too scared to work; we got Johns stoppin’ their appointment’s cause they don’t want to be suspects. Bastard’s got everybody on tenterhooks on this.”

“And this new bastard?” Mick growled, drawing her attention.

She didn’t say anything for a few long moments, and Mick drew closer and closer before LaSalle stopped him. “Let the lady think,” she muttered to him.

“Everybody’s terrified of the new man. He ain’t killin’ girls, but if anybody so much’s questions his authority, y’wind up dead. Saw two good men go down that way, slaughtered like lambs in a warehouse. Throats slit, bleedin’ out in front o’ me.” She shuddered. “I didn’t see ver’ much, but he – or his lackey – was tall, thick set but not mount’nous.”

“What else?” Simms finally spoke up, his voice gentler than the others.

Another shudder. “Somethin’ he said keeps naggin’ at me, like it’s important that I keep it in me head.” She closed her eyes. “He kept mutterin’ to ‘imself: honor thy father, honor thy father – over an’ over, like he was prayin’ or somethin’. Real reverent-like. An’ he was an American.”

“An American, you say?” Simms pressed, his Georgian accent slipping out a little more than usual.

Carolyn nodded. “Stronger accent th’n yours, though.”

Something seemed familiar, but Ashley wasn’t sure what it was. A faint whisper of something against her memory – a moment in Garcia’s inner sanctum, catching a glimpse of a file that disappeared almost as soon as she saw it; Georgia, seven sins… And that was all she could remember, and had simply thought it odd Garcia would hide it.

No one else seemed to recognize or think it odd – just another insane killer with a religious bent, it must have looked like to them, and Seaver put the memory from her mind.

Rawson turned dominant again, sliding up even with Simms. “And do you think it’s likely that this is the new Moriarty, rather than some lackey of the fellow?” He looked interested, fiercely fascinated, leaning forward.

Ashley caught a glimpse of Simms’s hand on Rawson’s hip – an oddly intimate gesture that seemed to act as a calming move, as Rawson’s posture slackened by a fraction.

“This new overlord of crime wilna get his hands so dirty,” Carolyn replied, “This man was too crazy t’ be anythin’ but a lackey – none o’ the folks’ll listen to Carolyn, though.” She shook her head, and Ashley was reminded of Cassandra from the Iliad. 

“All right,” LaSalle said, accepting the response. “What’s your take on the new power? Is there anyone you expect to be holding the madman’s leash?”

“If he’s anyone, ‘e’s probably part o’ the high society, like Moriarty was – sending a lackey to do his dirty work’s a rich man’s prerogative. It ain’t somethin’ I can see one of us slumdwellers doin’.” She shivered again. “Dunno why he’s importin’ American crazies, though.”

“We’ll figure that out,” Simms said. “We’re working with Scotland Yard. Head to the Tower if you have any more information about the Ripper or the new guy on the block.”

Carolyn nodded and they turned and headed even further into the slums, looking for more information.

 

The team met again in their makeshift conference room the next morning. Aaron looked around, hardly conscious of the fact that he was making a mental head count – but everyone was there, including the Shadow Team.

Sam Cooper stood next to the chalkboard, scrutinizing what little had been written on it the previous day with a look of disappointed resignation. He was as skilled a profiler as any of them – better, maybe. His style was reminiscent of Gideon’s; get abysmally deep into the psyche of the monster, and then learn who he could be. It was that, perhaps, that made him so good.

The rest of Cooper’s Shadow Team was good, too. LaSalle was fantastic at undercover work, Simms’ knowledge of American prison culture had saved them more than once, Griffith had experience with domestic terrorist groups like the Klan, and Rawson’s marksmanship was unparalleled on either side of the pond. Cooper had assembled some of the best in their fields and taught them the art of criminal profiling.

Of course, the members of Aaron’s own team were the best in their fields, as well. Reid could have taught at any university by the time he was sixteen, and his eidetic memory could be as useful as Garcia’s library. Garcia herself was the only mechanical engineer who’d managed to create such a library, and, had she chosen, she could have retired to some tropical island at the age of thirty on the money selling the patent would have provided. Morgan was the best in the world at stalking and obsessional crimes. Prentiss was multilingual and the daughter of an ambassador – her diplomatic immunity had saved several lives even before she’d joined the team. Dave Rossi, and old friend of his, had been one of the founding members of this team, having taken espionage skills he’d learned during the war and, with Jason Gideon, applied them to investigating crime. Seaver was learning from the best, and she had great potential.

Clustered together in this room, they were the people with the best chance of catching Jack the Ripper. Aaron had utmost faith in them, and in their skills.

“The information about the ‘new Moriarty’ is interesting.” Cooper turned to him. “He has an American doing his dirty work.”

“I don’t think there’s a connection,” Griffith said. “The Ripper’s too insane.”

Prentiss shook her head. “But the new power probably knows who the Ripper is – and if not, he’s probably as invested in catching him as we are, if only to control him.”

“Agreed,” Reid pointed out. “If we can get at him, we can probably convince him to help us catch the Ripper. We need someone on the inside to do this – the Shadow Cell’s trip to the slums made that absolutely clear.”

Aaron agreed. “And Carolyn believes that this figure is from the richer set.” He pauses and turns to Lestrade. “Are there any high society functions we can attend anytime soon?”

Lestrade nodded. “There’s one tonight, actually. It was supposed to be invitation only, though.”

Dave looked at Lestrade skeptically. “Ask the host if they’d mind if David Rossi, his daughter, and a couple of friends attend as well.”

Dave had a name in high society; beyond his work in criminal investigation, he’d written several bestselling books on the subject. He’d managed to become a fixture in Virginia’s upper-class functions, and had a name with clout in several English-speaking countries.

Lestrade nodded and headed for the door.

“So who are we sending?” Reid asked. “If Rossi’s idea pans out, that is.” He didn’t seem to doubt that it would.

“I’ll go,” LaSalle volunteered from the corner where she sat with Simms and Rawson. Aaron turned to look at her. She was young, pretty, and the best they had at undercover. It made sense. The only other woman in the room who could pull off a similar stunt was Prentiss – and Prentiss, for reasons unknown, hated undercover.

Meeting Cooper’s eyes and finding agreement there, Aaron nodded. “All right.”

Reid chose that moment to fidget, twirling a pen between his hands. Then he spoke. “I’d like to go as well. Might as well balance things out in terms of gender.”

This gave Aaron some pause. Reid was not the best among them in social situations. But he was of an age with LaSalle and Seaver, and he, while appearing completely guileless and unthreatening, had the best chance of remembering something seemingly inconsequential. And it was the seemingly inconsequential, of course, that often meant the most.

“All right,” Aaron repeated.

Reid nodded, and there was a strange gratitude in his expression. Aaron tucked it away in the back of his mind, reminding himself that he had placed a moratorium on members of the team analyzing each other.

The conversation turned to Garcia insisting on helping the women find gowns for the party, and Prentiss’s insistence that Reid wear proper dress clothes, which led to Reid walking out in something of a huff, insisting that his own clothes were perfectly fine and besides, what did it matter? He would be there to observe, nothing more.

Dave’s chuckle of amusement drew a sardonic twist of expression from Aaron, and the older man shrugged.

“You know Garcia’ll get her way eventually.”

Aaron supposed he was right.

 

LaSalle was a beautiful woman. Ashley knew that, in her head. She looked good in men’s clothing; Ashley had caught herself glancing when she walked by, after all.

But seeing her now, clutching her corset around the front of her body, smiling awkwardly over her shoulder at Ashley, Ashley felt the beauty like a brick to the face. From where she stood, LaSalle’s bare back seemed to beckon her with pale skin and thin shoulder blades. Ashley did her best to hide it, even from herself, tucking the feeling away.

“Could you help me with the lacing?” LaSalle asked. “I never really wore corsets; they make it difficult to run – and my dad always thought a woman ought to be able to run.” She smiled sardonically. “Now I bet he wishes I’d been more like my sisters, not running around in mens’ clothes chasing criminals.”

Ashley nodded, surprised at LaSalle’s openness. She stepped up to LaSalle’s back, briefly thinking of her own father. She began lacing up the corset, pushing away the memories and keeping her eyes on the laces and her own hands. She nearly dropped the lacing when LaSalle spoke again.

“You’re very quiet,” LaSalle murmured. “You think there’s nothing you can say that’s useful.”

Ashley blinked. “I thought we aren’t supposed to profile each other.”

LaSalle laughed a little. “You just seem so nervous around them.”

Ashley knew the meant the other members of the team. Essentially, it was true. The only one she felt really comfortable around was Rossi, and that was because she’d known him for more than a decade. “They have a lot of experience. I should defer to them.”

“Seaver.” There was something fierce in her voice. “You’re one of them. One of us. You ought to say what you’re thinking.

Ashley stayed quiet, finishing the lacing at long last, and LaSalle’s voice was softer when she spoke again. “At the very least, come talk to me. I was younger than you when I joined up with Coop and Mick. Then Prophet came around, and then Beth. But – well, it wasn’t easy, learning to speak up around people like them. I know how you feel.”

Ashley stepped back, and LaSalle turned around. The corset didn’t change much about her shape, but it enhanced her breasts. LaSalle looked down at them, and then back at Ashley with a mischievous grin. “Do you think Mick will stare?”

That made Ashley laugh. “And then Beth will jab him in the ribs, if Simms doesn’t.”

LaSalle’s grin turned absolutely wicked. “See, you’re talking. And making predictions, predictions about people – now just apply that to the case. Nice insight on Mick and Prophet, by the way.” She turned to her dress. “Damn, too many buttons.”

Ashley kept smiling. “Let me help you with that.”

 

Seaver seemed nervous. Reid thought it was strange – legally, she was Rossi’s daughter, and so would have been to many formal parties like this. Nevertheless, her face was, just barely, tensed, the smile on her lips was fragile, and her grip on his arm was iron.

“What’s wrong?” he whispered, leaning down close to her ear and hoping that the whisper would be misinterpreted by those present as a romantic overture rather than what it was.

She seemed to catch his train of thought, as she let out a high-pitched, mindless giggle before leaning up on tiptoe to reply, “I’m just a bit unsettled. I…it won’t affect the case.” When he nodded, she continued, “And I’ve heard you don’t dance.”

He laughed, sincerely. “I don’t. I can’t.”

She smiled. “I’ll back lead. Rossi can’t dance, either.” With that, she gently took his hand and led him out on the dance floor. He followed her body’s subtle instruction, feeling a little stiff, but capable nonetheless. They moved through the crowd of dancers, her right hand on his left shoulder and her left hand held in his much larger right, and he hoped they seemed normal enough – just a young American couple enjoying a waltz in an upperclass ballroom.

After a few numbers, it was time for the hors d’ouvres hour, and they walked to their table. Rossi and LaSalle were already seated, LaSalle looking at the place-setting as though it might suddenly come to life and eat her. Seaver shook her head and smiled at the other woman, sitting down next to her and surreptitiously nudging the appropriate fork. Reid sat down next to Rossi and looked over at him. Rossi already had a glass of wine and an appetizer that he was eating with well-controlled relish. Reid looked around for a waiter but didn’t see one, so he asked.

“He’s getting LaSalle’s wine,” Rossi replied. “Did Ashley lead?”

“Yes.”

Rossi grinned for a moment before raising his glass to cover his sympathetic amusement. “She’s pretty damn good at it,” he murmured conspiratorially around the rim, eyes glittering.

“I noticed,” Reid replied, as a glass of wine and an appetizer were set down in front of him. Reid had never seen it before and wasn’t sure exactly what it was. He looked at it hesitantly, and then turned to Rossi in confusion.

“It’s swan – you like duck, and they pretty much taste the same.” Rossi shrugged, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Reid nodded. “Thank you,” he replied, trying to ignore the swoop his stomach made.

The swan was delicious, and Reid found himself drawn into a whispered conversation on the history of murderers and assassins, explaining the trial of two Roman women accused of killing over a thousand men during their careers.

After appetizers and a formal, almost ritualized dinner, Seaver led Reid back out onto the dance floor, LaSalle and Rossi close behind. They danced for close to two hours, and it became quite apparent that, since they were Americans, no upperclass Briton worth their accent would associate with them.

“We should have brought Rawson,” Reid mused to Seaver.

She laughed. It was a real comfortable laugh, one that Reid had never heard from her, much less elicited, and Reid smiled. She said, “From what I’ve seen, I don’t think a Welshman would be much better.” Her eyes sparked, and Reid was reminded suddenly of Rossi. “And I doubt he’d take well to this crowd.”

She spun for a dip, and Reid caught her, his heart skipping and arm clumsy – for all of Seaver’s brilliant back-leading, he still couldn’t dance.

Then, there was an explosion by the door. Reid’s hand left Seaver’s waist and reached automatically for his gun as Seaver spun away again and growled when she appeared to realized she didn’t have her own. Reid moved toward her as he searched for Rossi and LaSalle amongst the panicking mob of partygoers. There was another explosion, much closer this time, and accompanied by a shattering of glass. He grabbed Seaver’s wrist in one hand and pushed through the crowd, brandishing his revolver and heading quickly toward the doors as two more explosions went off.

The fourth explosion was close enough to knock him off his feet. Something sharp hit him in the shoulder, and he hissed. He struggled to his feet and looked around for Seaver. He found that a table had pinned her, unconscious, to the floor. Reid felt terror bubbling up in his throat from the twisting coil of his innards.

Where was Rossi? That was the most sickening thought as Reid levered the table off of Seaver, whose face contracted in pain. Good. At least she could still feel.

There was a gunshot nearby, fired into the stuccoed ceiling, and Reid spun. It had to be Rossi, which meant he was alive. Reid stomped on the relief because there was no time to feel it. He leaned down, hitting his knees. He couldn’t leave Seaver, but it would be a dangerous idea to move her now. He had no medical training, and couldn’t say for certain how badly she’d been injured.

He almost shot LaSalle when she grabbed his shoulder. “I’ll stay with her,” she yelled over the chaos. “Go find Rossi!”

“You lost him?” Reid yelped, insides twisting – but LaSalle had a long cut on her scalp and was limping; it was clear she’d been thrown by one of the explosions. Turning away, he searched the ceiling for the bullet hole before racing in the general direction the shot had come from.

He found Rossi crouched behind a pile of rubble, gun in one hand and clutching his right side with the other. Blood saturated the cloth under his hand, and Reid swallowed the fear and tried to go cold as he slid in beside him, reaching to lower Rossi’s weapon.

“Thank God,” Rossi said, voice hoarse, when he noticed Reid. The relief dropped from his face, though, when he realized Seaver wasn’t with him.

“She’s with LaSalle. She’s hurt.” When Rossi tried to head back, Reid grabbed at him, pulling him down. “And so are you. What happened? Did you see anything?”

“No,” Rossi growled. “Bombs must’ve been planted beforehand, the bastards.” He coughed – Reid looked for blood, ice in his veins, but none seemed forthcoming, and he breathed a strangled sigh of relief – and leaned back against Reid breath shallow. Almost automatically, Reid wrapped an arm around his chest, above the wound, and pressed Rossi to him.

“Shh,” he hushed. “Wait for things to die down. Bitch all you want we’re out of here and you’re not bleeding, but please, please be quiet and let me handle this, Rossi.”

Rossi obeyed and his breathing started to deepen. Reid held on, heart still pounding, waiting for the dust to settle.


	2. Chapter Two

Aaron heard the explosions over Garcia’s telecommunications system – one, two, three, four of them, the first three spaced fairly equally and the final coming hard on the heels of the third.

Dave was in that building. And Reid, and Seaver and LaSalle.

The entire team was on their feet in an instant, Cooper already halfway to the door, eyes far-off in thought. Aaron caught him before he could make it out the door. “Careful, Sam.”

Cooper blinked and shook his head, coming back to himself.

“Get Scotland Yard on this,” Prentiss said, quick and hard. “We’ve got people in there, and God only knows how many civilians are injured.” She stood up, heading for the door, and Aaron let her – she’d proven herself to Lestrade; the man would probably do anything to avoid her anger.

Rawson was holding himself in check, barely, a snarl rumbling in his throat. Morgan was in a similar state of distress, his hand tight on Garcia’s shoulder.

Griffith and Prophet stood up simultaneously, then looked at each other in surprise before Griffith said, “I’ll go get Dr. Watson. He did promise to help in whatever way he could.”

“And he was a trauma surgeon in Afghanistan,” Garcia pointed out.

Aaron wondered how she managed to keep so much probably-useless information stored in her head – sometimes, she knew things that Reid didn’t know.

Griffith stalked off, her walk purposeful and intended to be intimidating.

There was a moment of silence, only broken by the sounds of chaos coming through the telecommunications system, which seemed impossibly loud now.

“Damn it!” Morgan growled, slamming a fist down on the table.

Aaron understood perfectly the sentiment. They all hated this part, the part in between knowing and being able to do anything to help.

Right now, there was absolutely nothing they could do, even though it ate away at everyone knowing that that ballroom had been bombed – and not knowing whether their teammates weren’t injured or even dead.

Prentiss returned looking triumphant. “We’ll have a couple of cabs as soon as we can get to the curb. Same rules as for the fire department here.”

Aaron nodded at her. “I’m sure Griffith will follow with Dr. Watson as soon as she can get him. Let’s go.”

The ride to the ballroom was fast, bumpy, and drove Aaron’s pulse up. Neither he nor Morgan was seated; Prentiss was between them, using her skirts as a cover as she changed into trousers – she can’t pick through rubble in a floor-length dress, she’d said.

When they arrived, it was already madness. There were women sobbing and screaming, men limping and staggering; the fire department blasting at the flames in the ballroom, which was lit from the inside like a lantern in the dark of a foggy London night.

Aaron searched the crowd for Dave, or Reid, or Seaver, or LaSalle, but couldn’t find them in the chaos.

The rest of the team began to fan out, searching and moving towards the burning building, Morgan and Prentiss leading the way and the others in their wake.

Aaron kept back, looking for the ranking fire-fighter to ask if they’d gotten everyone out of the wreckage before turning on the hoses. He found that they hadn’t, and that was enough. He took off his hat and coat, overturned a bucket over his head to soak himself in water, and followed his team.

It was difficult to see and, even, to breathe, the smoke and steam clouding his senses as he searched. Prentiss had already dragged two young women from the rubble, and Morgan was close behind her with a rather corpulent old man. Aaron blinked, trying to clear his eyes of smoke, though he knew that was futile, searching for his lost team members. They had to be here, they had to be – he would have seen them outside if they’d been there.

“Hotch!” came the cry out of seemingly nowhere in a voice he recognized – Reid’s. He whipped around, and there he was, his shoulders hunched and his arms wrapped around something.

Someone. Dave.

Dave was unconscious, and Reid was trying to lift him – trying and failing.

It took no more than an instant for him to be at Reid’s side, pulling Dave up between them and beginning to move toward the door. Once outside, they laid Dave down on the pavement, and Aaron asked, “What happened?”

“He got hit with something – I have no idea what. Shrapnel, I think. I wasn’t with him at the time – LaSalle was; she’s with Seaver now – have you found them?”

Reid’s eyes were wide with terror, rolling like a wild horse’s as he spoke.

“I don’t know.” Aaron tried to steady Reid with a hand on his shoulder, but the younger man pulled back and stood from the crouching position he’d been in while they’d hovered over Dave. He’d turned before Aaron could get his hand out, position tight, like an animal about to fight or flee. He was staring at the burning ballroom, clearly searching for them.

“Stay here,” Aaron ordered him, taking the step that put him in Reid’s personal space. “I’ll look.”

Reid looked at him, fear, risky determination, and a curious kind of strength warring in his eyes, but he ultimately backed down, crouching down again as if to continue guarding the unconscious man.

Aaron headed toward the building again, yanking another bucket from a nearby fireman and upending it. He moved into the ballroom, picking his way around the detritus as the fire department seemed close to defeating the blaze. He searched the room, concentrating hard on the dresses LaSalle and Seaver had been wearing, the dresses Garcia had bugged just in case of something like this.

A flash of blue caught his eye, silhouetted against the fires, and there was LaSalle, skirt torn half-off, arms tight around another unconscious member of his team. LaSalle saw him, hefted Seaver, and began to run, carefully but incredibly quickly, toward him.

“She’s hurt, unconscious, but we can get her out okay. Father always taught me to feel for breaks.”

Aaron nodded, sweeping Seaver into his own grasp and carrying her bridal-style. She was very light, and it was much faster carrying her than it had been carrying Dave – even with Reid’s not-inconsequential help. LaSalle was following closely behind him; he could practically feel her breath on his neck.

They made it out quickly, meeting the rest of the team in a circle – the medics had taken Rossi already, and Reid was standing, sooty, arms wrapped around himself. Everyone looked a little shaken when he arrived with Seaver unconscious in his arms. Prentiss was the first to speak: “Rossi’s gonna kill us all if she’s been badly hurt.”

“We’ll inform him when he wakes up,” Aaron countered.

Something seemed to loosen in everyone’s posture at his use of the word “when,” particularly Reid, who suddenly looked like he was exhausted, all the adrenaline funneling out of him quickly.

At that moment, Dr. Watson appeared from the crowd, Griffith following close behind, and stood at the edge of the circle, eyes on Seaver. Aaron turned to him and said, “I don’t know exactly what happened, but she’s been injured.”

“She was next to me when the fourth explosion knocked us apart,” Reid offered helpfully. “She was pinned under a table.”

“Any broken bones?” the doctor asked, all business.

“No,” LaSalle asserted. “I checked several times before I moved her.”

From there, things moved quickly, and soon the team was on their way back to their lodgings – excepting LaSalle, Reid, Dr. Watson, and Aaron himself, all of whom headed to the hospital to watch over Dave and Seaver.

Reid sat down in the first chair that was available, breathing harshly and cradling his head in his hands. LaSalle did not sit down, though the hospital offered plentiful seating. Instead, she leaned against a wall, arms crossed over her chest. Aaron realized that the bodice of her dress was torn, and the posture was keeping the cloth from falling down. It appeared that the corset she had complained about having to wear was also gone – she’d probably torn the dress in her haste to get out of the corset when things began to go wrong.

Aaron also did not sit down. He stood, staring at the door his friends and teammates disappeared into with Dr. Watson. He would wait until there was good news, or any news at all.

 

Reid felt somewhat embarrassed by his apparent inability to leave Rossi’s side. He’d snapped his refusal at Hotch and LaSalle when they’d suggested he go get some sleep – actually snapped. At Hotch. That simply was not done by anyone, much less by him.

But he waited for Rossi to wake up. He knew it was silly, he knew that if the team knew certain things, this gesture would be a siren in the night.

They did not know, though; they could not know.

He was tense and tired. When Rossi had lost consciousness in the ballroom rubble, the adrenaline had spiked and he had almost had the strength to carry Rossi out himself. The danger the fire posed to an unconscious man was worse than it posed to him, for Rossi could not escape the smoke inhalation when he was out cold.

Reid shivered. He hadn’t been strong enough to move Rossi on his own. That was probably the worst of it. He hadn’t been able to save Rossi on his own.

He looked down at the older man, tuning out the bustle all around that the bombing had caused, once again searching for any kind of change. He was breathing deeply, which was good given the placement of his major wound, and he did not look helpless, as so many people did when unconscious in hospital accommodations. That was a welcome change – Reid did not believe that he could fathom Rossi looking helpless or vulnerable, much less bear it if he saw it.

He had spent the last hour mentally composing an apology to Rossi, as well as a way to break the news that Seaver had also been seriously injured in one of the blasts.

LaSalle had been wrong about there being no broken bones; several of Seaver’s ribs had cracked when the table fell on her. One of her ankles was heavily bruised and would hurt to walk on. She also had several serious lacerations, though the voluminous ball gown had mostly protected her from that.

Reid looked over at the young woman, who was on the cot next to Rossi’s. She looked incredibly vulnerable with the blankets tucked around her, her breath coming a little shallowly.

It was beginning to grow light outside, and Reid estimated that it was about five thirty to six o’clock in the morning. He’d been awake all night and would likely be completely unable to function today, even with tea and copious amounts of sugar.

Presently, Rossi groaned, drawing Reid’s attention back to him. He was beginning to stir, and Reid shuffled his chair closer to the head of Rossi’s cot.

“How are you?” he asked when Rossi opened his eyes.

Rossi blinked at him for a few moments. “I feel like an elephant trampled over my left side. Where am I?”

“The hospital. It’s morning; you’ve been out for…” Reid trailed off, stymied. His time-sense was completely on the fritz; it was impossible to remember what the time had been when everything in the ballroom had gone to hell. “A while.”

Rossi seemed to notice that something was wrong. “And are you all right?”

No, Reid thought, but he replied with an affirmative anyway – no use in worrying Rossi when Rossi couldn’t do anything to help. “I’m fine. I got a few scratches and bruises, is all.”

“Good. I’d hate for two of us to have to sit this out. Aaron’s going to need everyone he can get.”

“Agreed.” Reid fidgeted. “I’m sorry.”

“What for?” Rossi seemed genuinely confused by the apology, and Reid worried at his lip. All of his composed apologies hadn’t seemed right when he’d composed them.

Finally, he took a breath. “We were stuck in the rubble for much longer than necessary. I couldn’t lift you; Hotch had to find us and help me. I don’t know how long it would have been before one or the other of us died of smoke inhalation.”

Rossi cocked his head to the side on his pillow. “Well, we’re both still alive. Don’t worry about it.” Reid was about to protest, but Rossi continued. “You really need to lighten up on the apologies.”

Reid couldn’t help but smile a little at that. Rossi had always said he apologized far too much, no matter what Reid was apologizing for. It was something of a comfort to hear it now, when everything had gone to hell and back again, and Rossi was rather severely injured.

“Where’s everyone else?” Rossi asked.

Reid’s smile fell off his face. “I don’t know. LaSalle and Hotch left a few hours ago.”

“What about Ashley? Is she all right?” Oh, dear. There was the one question that Reid had not wanted to answer, but now would have to.

“She has a few cracked ribs. They have her on morphine.” Reid tried to sound as clinical as possible.

Rossi’s expression went dark. “Is she conscious?”

“No. She’s right here,” Reid murmured, gesturing to the neighboring cot. “I’m sorry – the fourth blast knocked us apart and a table fell on her and I managed to get that off of her and then LaSalle showed up and I went looking for you.”

Rossi nodded, still looking concerned. “We should’ve had Prentiss with us.”

“Prentiss would have been an equally sensible choice,” Reid agreed. He looked down at his knees, trying not to look at Rossi, who without doubt would blame him for leaving her side.

He was not expecting Rossi to reach out and place a hand on his knee. “It’s not your fault.”

Reid looked up so fast that he risked whiplash. “But I…”

“No buts.” Rossi’s tone brooked no argument. “You look like a dead man walking. Go get some sleep; I’ll be fine, and I’ll look after Ashley.”

“I’m fine – it’s unlikely Hotch will let any of the four of us back into the field for a few days.”

Rossi began to glare at him. “Doesn’t mean you should sit here until judgment day waiting for God only knows what.”

Reid knew an order when he heard one, and ceased his protests.

 

Ashley fought her way back to consciousness, her mind hobbled by memories and half-understood nightmares. When she finally opened her eyes, she was faced with an unfamiliar ceiling and the worried eyes of Gina LaSalle.

“Hello,” LaSalle said softly, shifting her chair closer to Ashley’s bedside. “You’ve been unconscious for a long while.”

Ashley groaned. Of course she would be the one to be injured enough to be unable to continue investigating. It would appear that the heavens were conspiring against her ever being useful to the team. “What” – she cringed at how raspy her voice sounded – “did I miss?”

LaSalle shrugged noncommittally. “Rossi wallowed in self-deprecation for a while until I showed up with Reid an hour ago to take him back to our hotel. He got a nasty gash during the bombing. Hotch called in the team for a long discussion about the relevancy of the bombing to our investigation, and got into an argument with Rossi over Rossi’s fitness to return to the field. Coop took Hotch’s side, naturally, which made Rossi about ready to kill him, and Prophet had to use his ‘magical calming-people abilities’ to calm everyone down.”

“And what did everyone conclude about the bombing?” Ashley tried not to think about the comments LaSalle had made about Rossi’s apparent injury – she’d get it later from the horse’s mouth.

“It was clearly arranged by the new power in London’s underworld, which means that he knows who the Ripper is, and is working with him. We’re not sure why, or what the purpose of everything is – or where the American lackey fits in yet.” LaSalle paused. “Though, to be honest, there was some…unpleasantness about the American. No one will talk about it, but something is familiar to everyone but us about the man.”

Ashley nodded. “Carolyn’s story struck me as familiar, too. Something I saw Garcia looking at once – but I didn’t get a good look.” She tried to lever herself into a sitting position, and whimpered at the pain in her side.

LaSalle caught her by the shoulders and laid her down softly. “You have two cracked ribs and a seriously bruised ankle. You’re not going anywhere for at least another twenty-four hours.”

Ashley sighed. She hated feeling useless. And now, she would be useless.

“Hey, stop that.” LaSalle’s voice was gentle. “You couldn’t have known you’d get hurt. We got one-upped this time, but, trust me, it’s not happening again.”

“You can’t be sure of that,” Ashley murmured.

“But I can try, Ashley. And that’s really all any of us can do in the end.”

LaSalle had never used her first name before. Ashley blinked, looking up at her, trying to comprehend the softness she found there. “You called me Ashley.”

“It’s your name, isn’t it?” LaSalle said softly, smiling. “Now, rest a while – I’ll stay ‘til you’ve woken.”

Ashley tried to fall asleep; she really did. She closed her eyes and thought of sleep. But she knew too much now; her mind hummed with LaSalle’s answers and non-answers and the very presence and sense of the woman at her side.

She knew what that meant – that reaction to LaSalle’s presence meant one thing and one thing only. But that, that emotion, it was that which was forbidden. It couldn’t be named – it was the one taboo her biological father had been absolutely rigid on. He had broken almost every other taboo, but he had always been clear, utterly clear.

 _You will marry, Ashley, and bear children_ , his voice hissed in her mind’s ear. She had told him she wouldn’t – she had no desire for men. He’d struck her; told her that she was abominable, but that her desires didn’t matter in the end. _You will marry_.

“You’re not sleeping,” LaSalle’s voice came from above her.

“I’m trying.” It was true. Ashley was trying.

LaSalle let out a gusty breath. “Tell me what’s wrong. Are you in pain? I can get the doctors…”

“Gina,” she whispers, experimentally.

“Yes?”

Ashley bit her lip and opened her eyes. “I – I…” Good God, what was she thinking? There was no way – no way this could end well.

But at least this could end.

“I…I’d like to kiss you.” That would be enough for now, just a kiss that could help her, let her breathe LaSalle’s air for just a moment and pretend that this was possible.

LaSalle’s sharp intake of breath rocked her back to her senses. There was no way.

“All right,” LaSalle whispered, her eyes slipping shut as she leaned down, gentle as anything, and pressed her lips to Ashley’s.

Ashley was careful not to reach for the other woman, though she wanted to. She wanted so much – she had always wanted more than she could have. But she couldn’t ruin this by being forward, by reaching up to touch LaSalle – Gina – when she’d only requested a kiss.

When she pulled away, Ashley whispered, “Thank you,” and kept her eyes closed.

“I won’t ask you yet,” Gina replied, “But I will, someday soon.”

That kiss, and the promise of a future discussion, were enough. Ashley heard her biological father’s voice dwindle away to nothing, just as he himself had dwindled away to nothing as he twitched on the hangman’s rope.

When Gina asked, Ashley would answer.


	3. Chapter Three

Aaron looked around the crime scene. This was different from the others. The prostitute’s throat was slit, but there was a gash in her thigh and no other injury – no postmortem mutilation, no rape.

This had Tobias Hankel’s signature on it.

Aaron looked over toward Reid, who looked stonily composed. It was certain that Reid recognized the signs – Hankel had been responsible for the worst injuries the young profiler had ever received. Between that and Reid’s eidetic memory, there was no way this crime scene’s implications would pass over Reid’s head.

The others were gathered as well, and Seaver, Rawson, Simms, and LaSalle all looked particularly grim.

“That’s Carolyn,” Rawson growled. “She’s the one who told us about the American.”

Seaver gnawed on her lip for a few long moments. “Somebody ratted her out to whomever’s behind this. Which means either somebody saw us that night, or Nathan…”

“I’ll go look for whoever we need to find,” Rawson said, clearly seething.

“I’ll join you,” Prentiss said, stepping up to the Welshman. “Make sure you don’t shoot anyone in frustration.”

They moved off. Aaron turned his attention to the rest of the team. Cooper, Griffith, and Morgan were crouched around the body, conversing quietly. Simms had a hand on Seaver’s shoulder, trying to keep her calm, LaSalle standing sentry no more than a foot away. Dave seemed caught between going to Seaver’s side and going to Reid’s. The strength in Reid’s expression was beginning to break, and Aaron knew that Dave would notice.

Finally, Dave shook his head and walked over to Reid, who, to both Dave’s surprise and Aaron’s, sniped something quietly that was clearly meant to drive Dave away.

Dave shrugged and joined Aaron halfway between the body and the four people who would not go near it. He looked at Aaron with a measuring expression. “What’s going on here? Reid’s losing it over there – what is it about this bastard?”

Aaron sighed. “There was an UnSub who got away, the year before you came back. Reid was…injured during the hunt for him. This is exactly the same signature, and, according to Seaver and the Shadow Team, the woman lying there knew that the man holding the Ripper’s leash had a lackey from America who slit throats to kill.”

“It’s him, then,” Daved asserted. “Reid knows it, and the rest of you know it, and now I know it. Kid needs to watch his mouth, telling me not to bother with things I know nothing about…”

Aaron watched as David turned away and stalked off, angrily grumbling.

Reid did not loosen at all. He was tightly wound, and Aaron waited for the break of the tension, when either Reid or Dave would get sick of the back-and-forth and walk away.

“I’m sorry, Rossi, but this is none of your business,” Reid hissed, just loud enough that Aaron could hear.

“It is when it’s affecting how you’re dealing with this case. If a killer from the past is back, we need to be able to deal with it – we need to be able to know what we’re dealing with.” Dave wasn’t bothering to whisper, his voice clear and angry.

Aaron raised an eyebrow when Reid simply glared and walked away. Reid was clearly dealing with this badly.

But then, Tobias Hankel had been the one killer they’d faced who’d really and truly harmed Reid. And harm him he had – Aaron remembered the brokenness in Reid’s eyes when he had risen from a half-dug grave in Georgia, revolver clutched in a too-still hand.

Forty-eight hours of torture had produced that, and had changed Reid irrevocably.

Dave came back to Aaron after gaping at Reid for a few moments. He looked about ready to kill Hankel, though he didn’t know his name. Aaron turned briefly to scan the rest of the team – Simms had joined Morgan, Griffith, and Cooper, and LaSalle had wound an arm around Seaver.

“I don’t get it,” Dave growled. “There’s something you’re not telling me. Something happened, Aaron, and it’s not doing anyone any good if we’re not on the same page here.”

Aaron shook his head. “It’s not something we talk about.” It stung to keep information from Dave, but if Reid wasn’t willing to talk about it, and Hankel’s main modus operandi didn’t include what had happened over those two days in Georgia, it wasn’t necessary to tell Dave.

“Damnit, Aaron, tell me!” Dave glared at him, sharp and dark. There was an undercurrent of concern that was meant entirely for Reid. “He’s in pain.”

Aaron drew in a breath. “I’m sorry, Dave. It’s not my story to tell.”

Dave looked over in the direction Reid had disappeared, then turned back to Aaron. “I will find out what’s going on here, Aaron. I’m not letting him deal with whatever the fuck this is on his own.”

Then, he stalked off to the body, the set of his shoulders proclaiming much the same as his words had only moments before.

Aaron nodded. He’d had a feeling Dave would react like that. Reid would be in good hands.

 

They always came on suddenly, with no anticipatory discomfort, just a sudden unendurable agony that sent Reid scurrying for the needle if he was alone. It was as though a vise was gripping his head on all sides, slowly crushing it.

In the company of the others he hid them well, often better than perhaps was best for his health. He was a master of deceit, pretending he felt nothing, that his concentration was unaffected. He hoped no one noticed his increased forays "out;" forays that inevitably ended in an opium den, oblivion consuming him.

Presently, he stared longingly at the needle, wanting nothing more to feel the pinprick of pain before the darkness. His head was floundering under its own weight, and the low light in the room was fire to him.

He had placed the needle far away, on the other side of the room, because it shamed him. It shamed him to think he needed it, that he needed the "gift" Tobias had given him. He didn't want it, had never wanted it. Georgia was a smoky nightmare -- at least, that's what he wanted it to be.

In truth, he remembered every instant of those two days, from Charlie staring at him over the barrel of a revolver, to Raphael asking which of the team should die, to Tobias fleeing and Hotch appearing like an angel out of the darkness.

It was finally too much. He levered himself to his feet, shaking as though an earthquake had an epicentre in his skull. He bypassed the needle -- he couldn't do it, not with the others so close. But there was something he could do, somewhere he could go to save himself tonight. He heard Tobias' whisper in his head, that it helped, didn't it, wasn't it better to make it all go away. It was an escape. He could escape.

He stumbled toward the stairs, down into the London streets, barely pausing to yank his topcoat around his shoulders. He didn't bother with a hat.

He wandered for a while before he found the den, sunk back in a slum. He ignored the prostitutes and wondered if they'd beget another murder soon. If Tobias had found his way to London...killing the lustful and greedy would be his very first priority. It would be soon. Maybe this very corner would lose its prostitute. Tonight, he couldn't be bothered to care, and part of him felt ashamed of that.

He walked into the smoky place, looking for the "shopkeeper." The woman looked wary, and must have been beautiful in her youth, before the drug took hold.

He paid his price and settled onto a ratty cushion across from an older gentleman with sharp grey eyes that glazed over when he took a drag from the hookah between them. Reid knew the feeling, and took the pipe gladly when the man passed it to him, ready to give in to the oblivion.

The other man spoke. "You may want to see Dr. John Watson for those headaches."

Reid narrowed his eyes and did not smoke. "How do you know I'm having a headache?"

"The skin around your eyes is tight, your jaw is clenched, and you do not look as though you've slept well in weeks." The man paused, his head lolling to the side. "And now I find you're a well-educated American. I wouldn't expect to see a well-educated American in this place."

Reid would've responded if not for the low, familiar voice that growled from behind him. "And you'll never see one again."

Rossi put a firm grip on Reid's shoulder and dragged him to his feet. Through the aching in his head, Reid felt his face flaming in humiliation. Rossi didn't know. Rossi was never supposed to know about this, or about the reasons for this. Reid didn't ever mention it, and he was doing nothing illegal; on those grounds Rossi had no business knowing about it.

Despite this, Reid didn't struggle as Rossi led him out of the den and into the chill of the night. Rossi said nothing, though his grip on Reid's forearm was like steel, and Reid simply tried to part the haze of pain that still tried to drown him.

When they were back at the hotel, Rossi didn't let go, and instead pulled Reid into his room and sat him down on the bed.

"What was that?" Rossi asked him, dragging a chair so he could sit directly in front of Reid, as if this was an interrogation -- which, of course, it really was. "What was that?"

Reid didn't speak, and tried to keep his expression blank. Rossi stared hard at him, and he stared back, pretending that this was nothing, that Rossi was being irrational and nothing more. He kept his emotions from his eyes as he searched for some way out.

Of course, Rossi was the man that police in every major city in America called on when they couldn't "break" a suspect. There was no way out.

“I try to come check on you and find you rushing out the door, barely got your jacket, moving like man possessed – to an opium den? An opium den?” Rossi’s voice was stern, but he could sense the undercurrent of fear. “You went down to one of the filthiest slums in London to take opium?”

“There’s – I’m not doing anything illegal, Rossi,” Reid pointed out, quietly.

Rossi snarled. “How long have you been using? I may not like Gideon, but I don’t think he would’ve been your goddamn supplier.”

“Three years.” Since Tobias.

Rossi sits back in his seat, straight up. He’s surprised – as he should be; Reid has kept this to himself for those three years, telling no one he was still making use of the drug that had been forced on him.

“Do the others know?”

Reid shook his head – but the movement aggravated his headache into a crushing vice coupled with repeated, pounding blows, and he whimpered despite himself.

Rossi was close again in an instant, gripping Reid’s chin tightly and inspecting his face. There was fire – concern, anger, frustration – in his eyes as he looked, eyes skating down Reid’s face with purpose. Finally, he drew back. “You have a migraine.”

Reid kept his head as still as he could. “Yes.”

“Is that why?”

Reid struggled for a moment. How could he explain this to Rossi? Tonight, yes, but not when it started. The opium had come before the headaches.

“This time,” he finally murmured, closing his eyes.

Rossi let out a long, loud breath. “But you didn’t start using because of the migraines.”

“No.”

“Why, then?” Rossi asked, and his voice was soft, gentle, genuinely curious.

Reid’s stomach tightened. He didn’t want to tell Rossi about Tobias, about forty-eight hours of torture punctuated by impossible choices, about the track marks on his elbow that never quite faded away.

But he had to. For Rossi, he had to be truthful.

“The year before you came back to the team, we were called on a case in Georgia. People were being murdered according to the seven deadly sins, and we tracked down a man we thought could serve as a witness who could help us discover the killer.

“It turned out that he – Tobias Hankel – was our perpetrator. In a sense. He had three separate personalities; one was his father, an abusive end-of-days Christian fanatic called Charlie; another claimed to be the angel Raphael – Raphael was in control when Hankel killed; and then Tobias, the original personality, a weak-willed addict trapped under their thumb.”

He paused, taking a deep breath before continuing, low and quick, “I was cornered and kidnapped during my first encounter with Hankel. Jennifer had been the only other person present, and we had split up to search the premises.” Another pause, and he opened his eyes to find Rossi growing more and more angry – not at him, though, it seemed. “I…for two days, I was held hostage in a shack in a cemetery. Charlie beat me repeatedly. Each time, Tobias would offer me opium to kill the pain. He gave it to me, despite my protests. Eventually…” He looked down, staring at his knees. “Eventually, I wasn’t protesting anymore.”

“There’s more than you’re telling me, though,” Rossi murmured, not accusing, but just stating.

“Yes. The drugs reacted with one of Charlie’s beatings – I almost died that night. Tobias saved my life; he resuscitated me after I stopped breathing.” The memories began to float above the pain of his migraine – choking, choking, foaming at the mouth, then nothing. And then, he could breathe again, and was, harshly, unable to do anything else but heave air.

Rossi was very close, now, his hand reaching out to squeeze Reid’s shoulder. “I’m glad he did.”

The sentence was quiet, sincere, and, really, all that needed to be said on the subject. Reid smiled, weakly, glad himself that he’d lived – he would never have met this man if he hadn’t.

“I’ll stay here until you can fall asleep,” Rossi whispered, his voice as soft as that gruff baritone could be, and Reid was surprised to find himself being gently lead over to his own bed, and Rossi stripped him of his coat and waistcoat, tossing them over a chair. The older man blew out the candle on the lamp and sat Reid down onto his bed before helping him slide his boots off. “If you need anything, you know I’m down the hall.”

Reid nodded, the darkness perhaps swallowing the movement, and laid down, trusting in the man sitting next to his bed to guard him until he could sleep.

 

_My dear Mr. Aaron Hotchner,_

_I’m surprised you haven’t recognized my handiwork yet. Of course, it’s rather silly of me to assume, considering that I have that madman killing on my orders. But then, those poor whores, they were mine. I remember you claiming that knifing a woman signified sexual impotence. Do I look so impotent now, Aaron?_

_I’ve noticed your boy is falling apart at the seams. I hadn’t planned that, but it’s nice to see Providence smiling on me, as it has for the past fourteen years._

_The bombing, also, is mine. I heard that David was injured, but he seems all right. I’ll have to set that to rights as soon as possible, of course, but, for now, I’ll let it be. I was not there, but I was watching. I had my boy, Nathan, watching as you and your boy pulled David Rossi from the rubble. It’s a pity he lived. I would have liked to see your reaction if he’d perished._

_I doubt you’ll find me. I am Death, after all._

_But I am coming for you, Aaron, and for those you love. Do not mistake that for an empty threat._

_You should have made the deal._

_~ The Reaper_

Ashley placed the letter gently on the table. She’d heard, from Rossi, the basics of the Reaper case. She knew that it was one of the worst cases the team had ever encountered.

But there was something else, something that had turned the room into a grave, something that had sent a pall of sick fear over everyone present. Though the Shadow team was out on the street with the stab victim, the rest of them were here. She looked around at the team, seeing different levels of terror. Garcia was obviously on the edge of tears, her hands clasped tightly and shaking in her lap. Morgan had his hands clenched tight on the back of Garcia’s chair, his face too blank for the set of his shoulders. Prentiss was ashy-pale and still. Rossi looked like he was about to lose it, his eyes dark with rage and his hands clenched into fists. Reid was in the corner, staring blankly into space.

And Hotch…

Hotch stood, staring at the letter, as close to emotion as Ashley had ever seen him. He reached for the letter, and Ashley saw that his hand quivered as he touched the paper. She didn’t quite understand what the final line had meant, but she couldn’t break this silence…could she?

She found she could, and did. “I don’t understand. What does he mean, ‘You should have made the deal?’”

Hotch turned to her, looking like a dead man walking. “In Boston, the Reaper offered me a deal. If I called off the investigation, he would stop killing. I didn’t take the deal. He broke jail, and now…he’s here.”

“We’ll get him, Hotch,” Reid whispered from the corner, so soft as to be almost silent. Despite the softness, it was a fierce whisper, matching the fire in his eyes.

Reid stood up. “We know he’s here. We know he’s here in London, and that – that he’s got Tobias Hankel under his thumb and that he is the Ripper, or a copycat anyway. We know he’s here to try and get at Hotch and the rest of us.” He paused, blinking once. “We know that Carolyn knew too much and that’s why she was killed, and we know that that street kid was in the Reaper’s payroll. We just need to tie it all together.”

Seaver nodded. Whatever had happened to make the Boston Reaper a verboten name among these people, they could catch him. They had to catch him.

Rossi walked over to Reid. “You were working on a map this morning, a geographical profile.”

“Yes, I was,” Reid said, swinging around to face Rossi, fumbling in his pockets for a pen. He took the three long strides it took to bring him to the table, and Seaver watched as he ruffled through the papers and found the map, which was decorated with pen marks in different colours of ink. “The Whitechapel murders – we can pretty much disregard them now. This is a copycat; Foyet’s not the Ripper, he just used that MO to lure us here.”

“Right,” Rossi murmured, leaning over Reid’s shoulder. “But the three that brought us here, those are all Foyet, and then he had Hankel for Carolyn.”

Reid nodded emphatically. “Prentiss, can you go get the Shadow team? They can probably lead you to the exact street corner where they met Carolyn. Look for a nearby warehouse – there’s bound to be one, and there will be blood. Exsanguinations leave a lot of blood.”

Prentiss stood up, some of the color returning to her face as she went. Morgan moved to follow her, but Garcia reached up and grabbed his hand, as though on reflex, and so he stayed.

Ashley looked over at Hotch again, who was watching Reid and Rossi intently, something unreadable on his face. Ashley worried at her lip with her teeth, unsure if there was anything more that she could do.

It was at that moment that Prentiss returned, Gina and Simms in tow. “Rawson’s already going – I think this can’t end well,” Prentiss said, looking to Hotch.

Hotch didn’t react.

The silence was oppressive.

Simms looked at Hotch, then at Prentiss. “I’ll follow.”

Ashley sensed the undercurrent of fear in the room, but Simms slipped out, leaving the pall unbroken. She looked around again at the others, then meeting Gina’s eyes in a silent plea for help. Gina looked away.

Hotch left the room then, a figure shaped of what felt like death.

Ashley didn’t know what would happen next, and wasn’t sure she wanted to.

Aaron stalked out into the street, passing the Shadow Team as he went, passing the prostitute with her dozens of stab wounds, passing Lestrade as the Inspector tried to draw his attention, passing everything by. 

Haley.

He needed to wire Haley. She was safe, home with Jack, but he was not; he was in danger. And soon, if he did not end this, if he did not end George Foyet’s influence, they would be in danger as well. He couldn’t let them be endangered. He would do his best to survive this – there was sure to be some kind of final confrontation – but if he didn’t, Haley needed to know that Foyet was back and that there had been a letter. She needed to know that the team would do everything they could to keep her and Jack safe, and that was what mattered.

He moved toward the telegraph office with purpose and almost savagely wrote out his letter – something between reassurance and a last will and testament:

_Haley STOP I love you STOP Foyet is in London STOP Don’t worry STOP I’ll be fine STOP I love you STOP Trust me, and trust my team STOP If I can’t keep you safe they will STOP I love you and I love Jack STOP I swear I’ll be home soon STOP Love STOP Aaron STOP_

If the telegraph operator was confused by the disjointed telegram, she didn’t say anything, but just looked at him and nodded, her brown eyes muted.

Aaron left the office with a long exhalation of breath, his eyes scanning the crowd. He had to be vigilant, had to be able to survive this and get Foyet off the streets forever. If he didn’t, Foyet would be unstoppable. If the team couldn’t stop him, no one could.

He passed by an alleyway, and, in a moment straight out of a penny-dreadful, was dragged into said alleyway, and a chloroform rag pressed into his face.

His final conscious thought was of Haley.


	4. Chapter Four

The rest of the team filtered out of the conference room, even Garcia and Morgan, as Reid continued to pore over the map, enjoying the warmth of Rossi at his shoulder.

He found himself growing more and more nervous, though, as the events of the past few minutes ran through his head over and over again. Hotch looked on the verge of…something. Everyone was scared half out of their minds.

“It’ll be all right,” Rossi murmured, wrapping a hand around Reid’s wrist.

Reid jolted in surprise at the contact. His mind raced, trying to find an appropriate response as the hand at his wrist sent a thrum into his nervous system so strong that he could hardly keep himself from shivering.

If Rossi noticed, he didn’t say anything. He didn’t move his hand, either, and Reid did his best to ignore it as he continued staring at the map. “I know,” he managed after a moment.

“You sure?” The reply surprised him. “This has been hard for you.”

“I’m fine.”

Rossi didn’t say anything to that. Reid straightened up, and the hand on his wrist slipped off, as if it had never been there at all. He was still very much in Rossi’s personal space, however, and there was a long moment of nothing.

Then Rossi stepped aside, out of Reid’s space, and suddenly the drafty nature of the Tower of London was fully evident. Reid tried to ignore it.

“As long as you’ll be all right, then,” Rossi said.

The moment seemed awkward. Not quite tense, but there was something wrong.

Something broke loose in Reid’s mind. He could pretend around the others, pretend that it wasn’t a problem, that Tobias Hankel’s return only brought back unpleasant memories but nothing was really wrong. But Rossi knew that wasn’t true. Rossi had seen him at one of his weakest moments and guarded him through it. Rossi had guarded him, even, from himself.

“Thank you,” he whispered. “For everything.”

Rossi nodded. “You’re welcome.” He turned back to the map. “What can you figure out from this? You said the Whitechapel murders don’t matter here – I’m not so sure that Foyet wouldn’t stick to pattern.”

“If Foyet’s here, he’s here to hurt Hotch.” Reid took a breath. “He’s admitted it and taking claim for the killings – the ruse that brought us here doesn’t matter anymore to him.”

“Are you sure?” Rossi took a step forward, back into Reid’s space. “We need to be absolutely sure of this. Aaron and his family – hell, all of us – are on the Reaper’s hit list. We need to know exactly where he is.”

“You’ve got that right,” came Garcia’s voice from the door, shaken and completely afraid.

“He’s got Hotch.”

 

Aaron woke slowly. It took him a moment to remember the chloroform, and he blinked rapidly in the dark.

“Hello, Aaron,” came the Reaper’s voice, and a light flickered on above Aaron’s head. Aaron closed his eyes against the sudden glare. It was difficult, but he kept his breath even and steady, though he couldn’t control the wild drumming of his heart.

“Oh, come now, Aaron. I’m not letting you off that easy.” Aaron heard the slide of metal on leather, and couldn’t prevent the twitch that pressed his wrists against the shackles and his waist against the wide band holding him down on the wooden table. “Ah, that’s better. It’s so much better to have a good response when I do my work, Aaron. Now open your eyes.”

Aaron didn’t want to give Foyet anything, but he needed to know where he was – if he could get some bearings, maybe he could manage to get out. He slid his eyes open a fraction.

Foyet was leaning over him, silhouetted by the light, but the insane smirk was perfectly visible.

“Wonderful,” the man whispered, lips hardly moving to form the word. He vaulted up, planting one foot on either side of Aaron’s shins, a precarious position that still, nonetheless, put him on a higher, more dominant ground. “It’s wonderful to finally see you again. I’ve been busy, as I’m sure you know. You wouldn’t believe how many of that Moriarty fellow’s underlings I had to kill to get established here. I never quite got at his second-in-command, though. He simply,” Foyet snapped his fingers, “disappeared.”

“My team…” Aaron said. He looked warily at the wicked-looking knife in Foyet’s hand. “My team will find you.”

Foyet dropped down, his knees slamming into Aaron’s thighs. “Your team didn’t catch me until I wanted them to.” He stroked the blade of the knife, and it took everything in Aaron not to groan or scream as it split his skin and lodged deep in his chest. “Now, do you want to see my scars? Yours will be just like them.”

As the thought I’m not going to die, he needs me alive, I’m not going to die floated through Aaron’s pain-dark mind, Foyet began to undress. After a moment, Aaron could see the nine scars Foyet had inflicted on himself years before.

“Do you like them?”

Aaron refused to respond, and was rewarded by another stab, further down. “Do you know how long someone has to study the human body to be able to stab yourself nine times without dying?” Foyet whispered, leaning down so that he was inches away from Aaron’s face. He whispered in Aaron’s ear, “A long time, Aaron. I wouldn’t brag, but – well, I’m the expert, aren’t I?”

A third stab finally pulled a groan from Aaron’s lips. “Shh, Aaron. Save your breath. You’ll need it, after all. I don’t want you dying on me now.”

“What…do…you want…from…me?” Aaron asked, ignoring the warning.

“Your soul, Aaron.” Foyet whispered this in Aaron’s ear, sliding the flat of the knife against Aaron’s belly – and Aaron realized, through the fog, that Foyet had minimized the chances of infection, even, by stripping him to the waist before beginning. “I want to see you broken.”

“Now, Aaron,” Foyet whispered, thrusting the knife into Aaron’s abdomen and obviously relishing the long, coughing groan it produced, “Try to relax. Your body will go numb.”

Aaron felt himself obeying, his body scrambling for something, anything to keep itself from dying. He hissed, but knew that he had to live through this. Depriving Foyet of this control by dying wasn’t worth the grief it would cause the team, and the grief it would cause his family.

“Good, good.” The fifth stab seemed lesser, somehow, than the first four. “It goes in so much easier this way, doesn’t it?”

Aaron did not respond, his head swimming. The sixth and seventh stabs, in quick succession, brought him back, sharp pains on each side of his ribs. He responded as the bloody knife hung in front of his face, and Foyet, still draped over him, licked it. He choked on the foul heat of Foyet’s breath and said, “I won’t…let you hurt…them. I didn’t take…the deal. It’s me you want, not them. Not Reid, not Rossi, not the others. Me.”

“But I can break you by killing them, Aaron.” Foyet moved closer, and Aaron reflexively cringed away from the sick smile that the Reaper pressed into his neck. “I can do this to you, and when they find out, you will hide to protect them. You won’t let them see you hurt – you’ll sacrifice your health. And when you do that…it will only be a matter of time before you won’t be strong enough to save anyone. I can hurt you, and I can go on hurting you. I can take everything away from you, Aaron, and I will.”

Foyet idly drew the flat of the blade down Aaron’s throat before stabbing it into his shoulder. Number Eight. Aaron clawed at consciousness as it tried to ebb away, and held it. Foyet laughed, like sharp shards of broken glass. “Yes, I will go on hurting you, Aaron. First it will be the young Dr. Reid. I’m sure Tobias will have…words…for that boy. Yes, the doctor will fall, and then perhaps the lovely Penelope – watch her bleed out, reaching for a man who can’t save her. And won’t that turn Derek Morgan away from you, if you can’t save the woman he loves? Of course it will.” He paused. “I will take them all; I am Death, and no one can stop me.”

Despair lurked in the darkness at the edges of Hotch’s vision, which clouded with each word. The ninth stab was almost unfelt as the numbness took hold.

“If I don’t,” Aaron whispered, forcing his voice into steadiness. “They will.”

He heard Foyet’s laughter as he passed out.

 

“Valhalla,” Prentiss said looking thoroughly unimpressed. It was a mask, Ashley knew, hiding the desperate fear they were all feeling. “Interesting name for an Irish gangster.”

The man in question smirked lazily. “People remember it, and that’s what matters.”

Ashley bit the inside of her cheek. She was in here to watch. She had the freshest eyes, and they were expecting her to try and see everything clearly and objectively where they all couldn’t. So she watched as Prentiss sat down across the table from Valhalla. “Tell me where I can find George Foyet.”

“Who?” Valhalla tilted his head to the side.

“The man who rules the slums here,” Ashley clarified. “We need to know where he is.”

Valhalla looked at her briefly, then turned his eyes back to Prentiss. “The new Moriarty? I’ve only spoken to him once.”

“But he took you somewhere. We need to know where.”

Valhalla leaned over the table, looking interestedly at Prentiss. He said something in a language Ashley didn’t understand – possibly French, but she couldn’t be sure. Prentiss responded in kind, eyes narrowing. “Où est la maison?”

There was more French from Valhalla, and Prentiss stood up, said something short and soft-sounding, and left the room. Ashley followed her out and into their makeshift conference room. They met Rawson and Simms along the way; the men had just exited their own interrogation room, where the street urchin was being held.

Rossi and Cooper were conversing quietly in the corner. Ashley could see the anger in every line of his body from the set of his posture to the deep furrow in his brow. Reid was nearby, his gaze on Rossi, watching him with inscrutable eyes.

The others were gathered as well, all in varying states of distress.

“We’ve narrowed it down to a four block radius,” Reid said, turning toward them. “Did you get any information from Valhalla or Nathan?”

Prentiss was almost silent as she glided over to the table, her eyes falling on the circle drawn on the map. She pointed at a spot inside the circle. “There. Valhalla said there had been a bakery across the street – he could smell the bread cooking.”

“The kid would hardly talk,” Rawson added, joining Prentiss and Reid at the map. “Said he didn’t know anything and had nothin’ to do with Carolyn’s death t’boot.”

“Show him the letter from Foyet,” Cooper stated quietly. Rossi nodded in agreement. Rawson left the room, Simms following.

Ashley wasn’t sure where this was going – she couldn’t imagine something like this ever happening. She looked to Prentiss and then around for Gina, trying to gauge the emotion in the room. She needed to know what the hell was going on, what she was supposed to be doing and thinking and feeling –

No, she realized suddenly. No, I don’t. I’m new to this, but that doesn’t mean I have to become them.

That had been what Gina had told her, back before the bombing. She was a member of this team, and she had her own thoughts and feelings and could come to her own conclusions. She was Ashley Seaver, who had seen things as a child and then decided to stop those things from happening. That was the long and short of it.

“What do we do now?” Garcia asked, her voice shaking. “He’s got Hotch – what is he doing to Hotch?”

“Sweetheart, please don’t think about it. Nothin’s gonna happen to Hotch.” Morgan reassured her, but there was still worry in his eyes as well as hers. Ashley looked over at the others, and all of them wore similar expressions.

“We need to find them,” Cooper stated, leaning over Prentiss’s shoulder and examining the map. “If Mick and Prophet can’t get anything different out of the street kid, we’re going to have to try this building.” He looked over at Rossi. “We can’t resolve this without a firefight.” Rossi nodded, and Cooper continued. “We need to put together a plan. Foyet has the criminal underworld of London under his thumb – he’s going to have guards and lookouts.”

Simms and Rawson returned then.

“435 Brickton Street, according to Nathan,” Simms stated.

“That’s it,” Prentiss said, her eyes widening. “Across the street from the bakery, like Valhalla said.” She looked out across the room, and Ashley felt a momentous sense of foreboding.

They were on the edge, about to tumble over, and a storm was brewing.

 

Reid looked into the dark, refusing to lose control. This was going to be the hardest part – getting into the lair of the Reaper.

He looked to his left, where LaSalle and Simms crouched beside him near the outer wall of 435 Brickton. LaSalle had a look of pure determination, and Simms, as usually, was as calm and still as pond water. They leaned against the wall gently, Simms’s eyes up toward a roof across the street, where Rawson was waiting with his gun to give the go-ahead.

The others had their own positions, all around the building, and they were all ready. Reid thought of Rossi, Seaver and Cooper, who would be taking the front door with a group of London’s finest, and of Morgan, Prentiss, and Griffith, who each were taking a different servants’ entrance.

Reid and his group had the back door, while Garcia was coordinating their movement from her system at Scotland Yard.

There was a glint from the rooftop, and Reid looked at his teammates.

Simms nodded, and LaSalle shifted, about to stand. Time to go.

They went, rising up silently in the dark, sliding to the back door. There was a thug at the door, but LaSalle got him from behind with the butt of her pistol, and Simms began picking the lock.

It was only a minute or so before they were inside, their footsteps quiet in the kitchen. From the front of the house, Reid could hear the shouts of “Clear!” as each room was checked for inhabitants – and, of course, for Hotch or the Reaper.

They moved through, much more quietly, until Reid pulled open a door that lead to a set of basement stairs. Three faceless adversaries burst out of it, and Reid slipped away from them – it had to be here. It had to be. He shouted as much to LaSalle and Simms, who nodded back at him as Simms kept one of the men at gunpoint, while LaSalle had already knocked one unconscious and had the other pinned to the wall.

Reid began the descent, small lantern clutched in one hand, and his revolver in the other. The stairs were narrow, and the darkness was all-consuming beyond the small radius of his light.

Then, out of the darkness, came a familiar whisper.

“Veneratio tui abbas; veneratio tui abbas.”

The last time he heard those words – he had been tied to a chair in Georgia, a needle hanging from his elbow. His stomach heaved, feeling almost as if he would vomit, but he didn’t.

“Tobias?” he asked, instead, stepping down from the last stair.

His eyes were mainly acclimated to the deep darkness now, and he could see a form kneeling, a form that lurched to its feet and turned around.

“It was God’s will that we meet again.” It wasn’t Tobias speaking. The words belonged, without doubt, to Raphael. “It was God’s will that you escape, that you rise from the tomb, that you should confound death.”

Reid knew where this was leading. “I’m no Messiah,” he warned.

“You told Tobias that; but God’s will appears to disagree.” Raphael took a step toward him in the light. “You were tempted by him. The devil’s water is what he gave you for temptation, and you, in Christlike fashion, denied it three times.”

Reid’s stomach twisted again. “I’m no Messiah. I’m not sinless – not by a long shot.”

“You know the Word better than any mere Man, Dr. Reid. Confess your sin.”

“If a man also lie with mankind as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them. Leviticus 20:13.” Reid’s voice rang tight in the otherwise silent, dark room. “My blood is upon me.”

Raphael took another step forward, and the lantern cast a sharp interplay of shadows and yellow light across his face. “You confess your sins, then? And so turn away from them?”

“No.”

“Dare you to tempt God’s wrath?” Raphael’s face began twisting in rage.

Reid breathed quietly. “I don’t believe in God.”

Raphael raised a gun from somewhere in his long jacket, a revolver that matched Reid’s in model and caliber. “Repent; for In the beginning there was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

“Thou shalt not kill.” Reid raised his gun as well.

“Devil,” Raphael spat. “St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle; be our defense against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him, we humbly pray—“

“Judge not, lest ye be judged.”

That seemed to stymie Raphael. Reid took the moment to lunge forward and tear the gun from Raphael’s hand, flinging it across the room. “Don’t try to out-quote me.”

Raphael disappeared, then, replaced by Charlie. Charlie slapped Reid across the face, and Reid stumbled back, hand still tight on both his gun and his lantern. He regained his balance as Charlie moved in for a second blow, which he barely dodged, and he threw the lantern aside. He needed both hands, and in the dark at least both of them would be unable to see.

Charlie cursed at him, and Reid moved toward the sound, swinging his gun – if he could avoid gunning down anyone, he would, and he’d result to bludgeoning Charlie into unconsciousness rather than shooting him.

The gun missed, whistling in the air, and Charlie’s fist connected with Reid’s side, knocking him off-balance in the dark. Reid struggled to stay upright, and he collided with the edge of a table. He’d half-fallen on it when he realized that there was something on it – someone.

Hotch was tied down. Reid scrabbled up to find Hotch’s throat in the dark, not wincing whenever he felt blood, and found a feeble pulse.

He cast himself forward from the table. Hotch was alive, and if he was going to stay that way, Reid needed to make sure Charlie or Raphael couldn’t stop him from bringing Hotch out of this house. So he had to make sure they were incapacitated.

Reid swung wildly with the butt and barrel of his gun, dropping low to avoid any strikes of Charlie’s that might strike true if he were at his full height.

After a few seconds of blind flailing, Reid’s gun connected with something fleshy – probably Charlie’s gut, given the noise the man gave when he was hit. Reid didn’t give Charlie a chance to recover, instead swinging his gun higher on the next pass.

This time there was the crack of metal on skull, and the soft thump as Charlie slid to the floor.

Reid dropped down next to the unconscious killer and fumbled for his handcuffs, quickly fastening his hands behind his back. Then he stood up and felt his way back to the table. When he had one hand on Hotch’s ankle – yes, it was definitely Hotch; there was the second gun strapped to his ankle – he dug through his pockets for a match and a stub of candle.

Finding these things, he lit the candle and surveyed the room, carefully avoiding looking at Hotch on the table.

His lantern and Raphael’s gun were in the same corner, the lantern irreparably broken by the trip across the room. Reid shrugged and turned toward the stairs, setting the candle on the table next to Hotch – he had to find the others; Hotch was alive, but probably fading fast.

 

It turned out Foyet was in the master bedroom of the house. Seaver clutched at her shoulder – one of the lookouts had had a gun when she wasn’t expecting him to – and held up her gun, trying to get a good aim on the Reaper.

Rossi also had his gun up, and he looked furious.

“Where’s Hotch?” he growled at Foyet, cocking his gun.

“David. How lovely to see you.” Foyet bared his teeth in something like a smile. “I must say, I’d been hoping you wouldn’t survive my little bombing – if anyone could have been killed, I would have hoped it would be you.”

Rossi took a step toward Foyet. “I’m pretty damn alive. So shut up and put your hands on the wall. You’re under arrest.”

“Really, David? I don’t see any of London’s finest in this room. Only an old man and a little girl who really ought to have stayed home.” Foyet shrugged his shoulders. “You’re a terrible father, you know, letting your daughter into this investigation.”

“You know nothing,” Ashley said softly. “You wouldn’t know a terrible father if one bit you in the ass.”

Rossi’s eyes snapped to her. “Seaver,” he warned.

“Oh, and you won’t even use her given name – because you’re working. How professional.”

Ashley shifted her gun. “He doesn’t have to use my given name. Because yes, we are working. Now, I’d suggest you do what he told you.”

“It’s over, Foyet. We’ve got you. Now tell us where Hotch is.”

“I don’t think so, David. Now, I must take my leave. David, you’ve been given a reprieve – you’re not my next target.” Foyet took a step – but not toward the wall.

He threw himself through the window, leaping out.

Two gunshots rang in the room, one from Ashley’s gun, and one from Rossi’s.

Rossi rushed to the window, but when he got there, he cursed. “Fuck. He’s gone. There’s blood on the sill, so one of us hit him but – fuck it, go get Cooper and the Yard.”

Ashley nodded, though pain throbbed like a knife in her shoulder, and did as told.

 

They were gathered – sans Seaver and Hotch – outside the hospital. Reid shivered.

They’d failed. They’d gotten Hankel, but Foyet had gotten away. The Reaper was still out there, but he likely would leave London, to find fresh ground.

“Next time,” Simms murmured.

“The point was that there wouldn’t be a next time.” Rossi’s voice was tight.

No one asked what had happened in the master bedroom of 435 Brickton Street, but Reid had a feeling that it was going to haunt Rossi until they caught Foyet.

“Next time,” Prentiss said, firmly. “Next time he attacks, we’ll catch him. We won’t let him hurt Hotch again.”

There was a murmur of assent around the group, and they dispersed, looking as numb as Reid felt. Reid remained where he was, because Rossi seemed disinclined to leaving, and Reid wasn’t going to let him be alone tonight – Rossi had been there for him; it was only fair that Reid do the same tonight.

“It’s not your fault,” he ventured.

Rossi looked up at him. “How do you figure?”

“You couldn’t have known Foyet would’ve thrown himself out a window to escape.” He took a tentative step toward Rossi. “And certainly couldn’t have known that he had a way to survive the fall.”

“Doesn’t really help when you know the bastard’s still out there.”

“I’m sorry,” Reid whispered.

Rossi sighed. “He said, while we were trying to arrest him, that I shouldn’t have let Seaver become part of the team. Called me ‘a terrible father.’”

“He lied. Seaver knows the risks. She’s an adult, and she can make her own choices.”

That seemed to comfort Rossi, because he nodded, and there was something a touch less tense in his demeanor. Reid bit his lip and came closer, putting an awkward hand on his shoulder.

Rossi made a soft, sad half-smile and covered Reid’s hand with his own. “Thanks.”

Reid nodded, wordless.

“You didn’t do too bad yourself, taking on Hankel.” Rossi spoke softly, squeezing Reid’s hand. “How are you?”

“I…I’m all right.”

Standing here, in this moment – despite everything – it was true.

“I merely stir, press, feel with my fingers…  
…To touch my person to someone else’s is about as much as I can stand.”  
~Walt Whitman

~fin~


End file.
